Monte Carlo, Monaco — New watch company Ateliers deMonaco has finalized The Carré d’Or Squelette TB- RM 1, an in-house Tourbillon minute repeater, according to a press release received by Elite Traveler.
Some of the special features:
– The dial is a hand cut open dial (skeleton), enabling you to look directly onto the movement. – The movement is hand engraved with every sunbeam of the pattern carved into the movement by hand, one at a time; Each sunbeam represents 1 minute. Hand engraving 1 sunbeam stripe takes about 15 minutes, making the total engraving task adding up to almost 1000 minutes for each individual movement! – The Grand Tourbillon is floating behind the sapphire bridge with double anti reflexion coating on the front and a hand mirror polished bridge on the back. – The back has the unique 3 dimensional deMonaco engraving, a signature trademark of the brand; – Speed regulation of minute repeater with 18K gold weights. – The highly complicated case construction (55 components ) with the activation mechanism is fully hidden in de 18K gold side panel. – One of the few, if not the only, water resistant square minute repeater case in the world. – Lastly, it is made in a limited edition of only 8 pieces worldwide.
The watch comes in a special case that is designed as a resonance box. The wood chosen is curly maple, often used for exclusive musical instruments like Stradivarius violins due to the deep sound it can produce as well as beautiful pattern. The base plate exists of 2 parts “bookmatch”, which means it was originally one piece of wood, that is cut apart like opening a book. As a consequence, you have almost perfect mirroring patterns aiding visual depth and light reflection.